Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

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Not a straight forward storytelling, and no narration bs that I don’t know why I personally dislike. But still, Paul Torday manages to give the story a three-dimensional PoVs, without inviting the many narrators.

Paul Torday - Wikipedia Paul Torday - Wikipedia

Sheikh Mohammed has a vision, Vision 2020, he wants to take salmon fishing from the Highlands in Scotland, to his country, the Yemen. He has faith (in all senses of the word) and his calm and belief have a positive effect on Jones; despite the disruption the project causes to both his professional and domestic life, Jones clearly grows during this period. But for the sake of capitalism, and industrialists, who need cheap minerals of the foreign land, are above everyone. Genius people around them have to make it work. While we can see, Dr Alfred is the one who was getting influenced by the Wadi culture. A man who had no faith started to believe. Things are still going badly in the Middle East, and this sort of project could be just the thing to impress the British public (bringing something very British to the Middle East, and doing so by using British expertise and know-how) as well as win friends in that area of the world:There were parts of this novel I liked - I thought the satire of bureaucratic pseudo-politeness was pretty funny, and I found the discussion of faith a little underdeveloped, but still interesting. There is a perfect segment in the middle of the novel where Peter Maxwell, apparently caught up with the idea of bringing peace to the Middle East, and not just through fishing, develops a game show called Prizes for the people. His first contestant is a desert dweller, who on eventually answering a question correctly is awarded a state of the art dishwasher. Perplexed he asks what to do with the machine. Maxwell has concluded that what these people really need is tech and the ability to shop for the items they lust after but cannot afford. He believes jealousy of their Western counterparts is the root cause of all of the tensions and it can all be solved by issuing credit cards and TV's to the masses. He somehow gets as far as explaining this preposterous idea to politicians including the Prime Minister. After a long silence, he is told that he needs to get out more.....

Salmon Fishing in the Yemen – Book Review | literarylad Salmon Fishing in the Yemen – Book Review | literarylad

Likewise with interview responses. I’ve seen extracts from the kind of interviews that are portrayed in the book. I’ve seen high-profile characters being grilled by commons select committees. They often have something to hide. They’re generally guarded, cautious, nervous, indignant, untrusting. I’ve never seen them chatty. I’ve never seen them go off on a ‘by-the-way’ tangent, relate a conversation (with complete word-for-word dialogue), give away personal secrets of the people they’re being asked about, tell a story they don’t absolutely have to tell, with all the descriptive ephemera of a novel. All of this did what for me is a cardinal sin for a writer of fiction – it disturbed my willingness to suspend my disbelief. Torday’s characters believe it’s really biblical to offer water to strangers while you don’t have so much water yourself. Is this really true in a Western country like Britain? The writer must know something. He’s been to the Middle East many times. He can surely make comparisons but is that a fair comparison? Did humanity really die in the West? Is that so simple? Or is the writer being naïve and does he just glorify the East out of proportion? Isn't that an image we'd rather have in our mind's eye than a tank at a crossroads somewhere in Fallujah ?

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The book progresses towards the unveiling of the project, the releasing of the salmon -- with no one knowing what will happen then. RECOMMENDED to lovers of British novels and everyone else who would enjoy the beautiful scenery of Yemen, and the intrigue behind belief of any kind.